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Eurolines runs an overnight coach service from London Victoria to Brussels, which suited me perfectly for quick getaway. The coach deposited me at Gare de Nord at 5.30 am just as the city was beginning to shake out of its slumber.
I wandered around the station a bit before finally heading south on Boulevard Jacqmain. The Grote Markt is almost right behind the Bourse. To me, the area beween the Bourse and the Grote Markt seemed to be intensely Greek.
The Grote Markt was almost entirely empty when I reached there. The city’s largest and most famous square is a world heritage site surrounded by Hôtel de Ville (Town Hall), L'ange (The Angel), and Broodhuis (Bread House).
Hôtel de Ville is built in Gothic style, complete with a 96 m tall tower on which Archangel Michael, the patron saint of Brussels, stands and watches over the town. It also houses the Tourist Information Center. Broodhuis, which used to be a bakers’ outlet, is now a Museum better known as King’s House. Interestingly, the only diamond jeweler on the square is Indian, not an Antwerp Jew.
Next, like any first-timer, I headed to the Manneken Pis, the 24-inches tall naked and urinating bronze boy. In fact, in Brussels it would seem that all roads lead to him, since almost all road-directions include directions to the mannequin.
The legend goes that the troops of the two year-old Duke Godfrey II of Leuven put him up on a tree to inspire them in a battle against the Berthouts. Perched in the tree, he urinated on the troops of the Berthouts, who ended up losing the battle.
I have also heard an alternative version that is funnier and also makes more sense: While Brussels was under siege in the 14th century, a little Brussels lad named Juliaanske chanced upon the enemy plot to blow away the city walls. The smart little one urinated on the fuse and the charge, thus saving the city.
While the Jérôme Duquesnoy statue itself is from 1619, it is said that it was preceded by a similar stone statue that delivered alcohol, and stood in the same place. (Naturally then, both the restaurant-bars next door are named after Manneken Pis)
The inscription under the statue says, “In petra exhaltavit me, et nunc exaltavi caput meum super inimicos meos,” which is funny because the statue has been stolen numerous times.
In 1747 after the Manneken Pis was recovered from a strip club, where the French soldiers that had stolen him left him, Louis XV offered him a costume. Since then the Manneken's wardrobe has grown to include several hundred costumes that he dons on the directions of an organization called The Friends of Manneken-Pis.
While there, I also discovered that there are similar statues in Geraardsbergen, Hasselt, Ghent and a French village called Broxeele (I don’t understand French, but my sense is that Brussels and Broxeele would probably be pronounced identically in French). In fact, Geraardsbergen says that its Manneken Pis is older than the one in Brussels, a claim that Brussels naturally vehemently rejects.
There is a nice little waffle shop just a few meters up the Rue de L’Étuve that offers amazing fresh waffles. Interestingly, the chocolate shop right next door to the statue is at least managed exclusively by Chinese.
The souvenir shops all over the town have collectible metal and resin effigies, keyrings, corkscrews and chocolates shaped like Manneken Pis, which is hardly surprising considering that this little boy is Brussels' most famous landmark and icon.
Also quite naturally, there are homages to the Smurfs and Tintin all around the town. And if one is vigilant, one can also notice some references to Asterix. Surprisingly though, M. Poirot is conspicuous only by his absence. Like all good pollsters, I didn't ask anyone about it but am speculating that perhaps the Belgians never embraced Englishwoman Agatha Christie's fictional detective as their own.
Back at the Grote Markt, life had started buzzing. Almost right in the middle of the square, some people were setting up what seemed to be a flower market, and on closer inspection turned out to be a flowering-plant market. The stewardesses had starting scribbling the day’s menus on the menu boards outside the restaurants. And some tourists had already started clicking pictures.
Brussels is an island of French in an ocean of Dutch/Flemish. In the lower town, French is almost the exclusive tongue used. That said, most shopkeepers around Grote Markt and Manneken Pis do also converse in English, a consequence of having to deal with a large number of tourists on regular basis.
As one makes one's way through the Rue des Bouchers, which is packed with restaurants as the name suggests, one is told of a female counterpart to the Manneken Pis.
Call me a sexist, but somehow the concept of a naked boy taking a leak in public sounds less obscene than that of a similarly attired girl squatting to do the same.
Located at the end of Impasse de la Fidélité, which is marked mainly by the blue signs of Delirium Café bearing a pink baby elephant, Denis-Adrien Debouvrie’s Jeanneke Pis statue/fountain was installed in 1987 as, one assumes, a gender equality statement. She is also geographically a counterpoint to Manneken Pis, being located as she is about the same distance away from Grote Markt in the opposite direction.
Jeanneke Pis is much bigger than Manneken Pis, though. The statue itself has about the same height as Manneken Pis does, but since Jeanneke is squatting, she is probably about a meter tall. Therefore, proportionally she is probably eight times the size of Manneken Pis in terms of volume. Notice, I didn’t say “in terms of bronze used”; that’s because Jeanneke Pis is made of limestone.
Once you have traversed your way back through what I call the “Food Lane”, and emerge at Place Agora, you’ll find an underground market at Grasmarkt. The stalls in this market sell everything from beads, clothes and shoes to luggage to store the beads, clothes and shoes. I think of this market as a miniature version of Palika Bazar in New Delhi’s Connaught Circus, not the least because quite a few of the shopkeepers are Desis and Tibetans.
From the Grasmarkt it is a short walk on Rue de la Montagne to the Cathédral and Musée. The building is impressive as are its numerous stained glass windows. While I was there, a choir of little schoolchildren sang a motet enthusiastically and beautifully.
Oh, one thread that I caught there, but am yet to explore is the involvement of Hungary and Hungarian church in Belgium. There were breadcrumbs to pick up all over the church, not the smallest being a large chart detailing "Medieval Dynastic Saint-Cult in Hungary"
Considering my day done, I headed north, past the Opera and the Place des Martyrs.
My day was hardly done though, as I ended up chatting till 3 am with a bunch of people that just gravitated into the group. There were the three Americans, of respectively Korean, Chinese and American ethnicities, who had been out “doing Europe” for about six weeks, and were returning to Los Angeles the next morning. There was the Chinese academic doing research on what makes people happy. There was the unusually quiet Spanish guy from Madrid.
And of course, there was a Canadian figure-skater who, having graduated from college last year, had spent the last six months in Croatia and was headed to Bucuresti to do some volunteer work for 2 weeks. On her way from Toronto she had stopped over in London for a couple of days to see a friend, and had had her luggage stolen, and yet had soldiered on to Croatia where she did an au pair on a farm.
It was in this esteemed gathering that I learned that the only reason anyone would want to visit Brussels is the beer. Compared to the Belgian beer, Budweiser tastes, to use a direct quote, “like piss”. This might well be the case, as these were the strongest beers I had seen anywhere. While most beers available worldwide have somewhere between 3.5% and 5% alcohol by volume (7% to 10% proof) and the ones that have 5.5% alcohol are considered extra strong, I actually saw beers with up to 17.5% alcohol, and was told that it went up to even 20% for some beers.
The next day, while I did check out the Jardin Botanique, I spent most of my time in the upper town.
The most imposing structure, of course, is the Palais de Justice, the Law Courts of Brussels. Described as the biggest secular building constructed in the 19th century, the Palais was built using money from Leopold II's Congo Free State.
Straight down from Place Poelaert on Rue de la Régence lies the Petit Sablon, a pretty little garden surrounded by 48 bronze statues representing different guilds. The flowers and fountains apparently have been an inspiration to local artists, and I found at least one girl drawing on the beauty to write poetry in French.
Right behind the garden is Parc d’Egmont, that can be reached through the stairs about 50m to the south on Wolstraat. While this is a bigger park, it is more of a green field than a garden, and not quite worth a visit, unless you are planning on an afternoon siesta.
Just a short way further down from Petit Sablon on Rue de la Régence is the Musea Voor Schone Kunsten, followed by Place Royale. Place Royale provides the entrance to the cathedral of Palais Royal. The church is much smaller inside than it looks from outside, though it does house two splendid paintings: Venite Ad Me (Come to me) and Consummatum Est (It’s over).
When I was visiting, the outside steps of the building were serving as an outdoor studio for a class of some young artists who, I assume, were drawing inspiration from the excellent views of lower town afforded.
From there I took the side alley that opened into Brederodestraat and followed it all the way down to Troonplein. As you might have guessed, I was headed to the European Parliament building a short walk down the Rue du Luxembourg. While it is not the most impressive glass and steel structure I’ve seen, I quite liked the modern architecture.
Considering that the European Parliament is located here, it is not surprising that this part of town is quite cosmopolitan.
By circling around Parc Leopold using the pathway starting immediately to the right of the EU Parliament building, one can reach the tiny Museum of Natural History. The Jubilee Park and Museum of Military History are located a short way down on Rue Belliard, but I decided to skip the Jubilpark, which seemed as unexciting as the Parc Leopold.
Instead, I headed back towards the city center on Rue de la Loi. The surprise encounter on the way was Bank of Baroda, an Indian regional bank, before I reached Palais de la Nation. While the building itself is not massive or highly ornate, it is located next to Parc de Bruxelles, which is home to characteristic statues. This peculiar style focuses in a great deal of detail on the bust part of the statue, and chisels out the rest of the body in rough, eroded stone.
I was also lucky to reach Parc de Bruxelles at a time when the park fountain was dressed in a rainbow. It was quite something, I have to say.
My last stop on the way back was the Congresplein, erected in the memory of the unknown soldier.
Overall, Brussels works very hard to maintain its vintage “character” and is quite a beautiful city, but if you are tourist, it is not more than a one-day destination. I spent about two half-days there, and was able to absorb most of the sights and sounds of the city. And I was essentially just walking around! If you use public transportation, and plan your trip, it should definitely take less time to “do” Brussels.
Since I normally prefer a laid-back attitude of gradually discovering the nature and character of cities and their people, the above statements and advice might seem quite uncharacteristic. But the fact remains that Brussels just didn’t quite pique my curiosity enough.
The most amusing incident of the trip came at the fag-end. I had reached the Eurolines office at Gare de Nord a little early and was waiting to check-in when something caught my attention. I thought my ears caught the sound of “…prezece…” being uttered, though I’d like to believe that I had sub-consciously heard substantially more than that before venturing out to ask: “Ești Român?”
The middle-aged gentleman at the receiving end of my query was startled out of the conversation with his companion. And now both of them were looking at me with an unwavering expressionless gaze.
Maybe I hadn’t gotten through, I thought, and repeated the question. And it was then that I saw him give, almost nervously it seemed, the slightest of nods, which I had noticed the first time around but dismissed as my imagination.
I suppose that it was only logical for him to ask, “Și ești Român?”, however ridiculous it might have seemed.
“Nu, Indien”
“Locueşti în Brusel?” he asked, or at least I think that’s what he asked.
“Nu, Londra”
“Vorbeste Româna?” he pointed to the clerk at the counter.
“Cred că nu”, I tried to summon my Romanian vocabulary.
“Italien?”
And I arched my eyebrows and shrugged my shoulders in the international gesture for “I haven’t a clue.”
To cut a long story short, the gentleman under question was trying to find if he could get a place on a coach to Romania on the 16th. Unfortunately though, he spoke only Italien and Romanian, and the counter clerks spoke only Dutch/ Flemish, English and French. So I ended up acting the interpreter, gasping for breath while swimming in the linguistic ocean.
Before you ask, the funny thing is that I understand only a word or two of Romanian, and do not know it well enough to have even a simple conversation in the language.
So there.
Oh, and I managed to wrap-up this trip, including travel, boarding, lodging, and souvenirs, for under £150.
I woke up pretty early for a Sunday, and looked out of my window to see a strong snowfall. That's right! It snowed in London in April, after a relatively warm winter. The climate change surely is happening faster now (click here and check out this must watch BBC documentary).
Within an hour or so, the falling snow thinned, and the flakes became much smaller, to the extent that they became the kind that float in the air. It remained that way for an inordinately long time, as far as I was concerned. I needed to go out, but didn't as I knew I needed to take many pictures and if any of the floating flakes landed on my camera's lens, they'd spoil the photos.
By the time I reached Westminster, the torch had already left Trafalgar Square and was headed our way. By then, there had been an attempt to snatch it and another to extinguish it. At least three explosions had happened (compressed sodium bicarbonate explosions - can't quite call them bombs), and police had barely managed to prevent a conflagration between passionate protestors and zealous Chinese youth in Trafalgar Square.
In fact, the torch was making only crawling progress, surrounded respectively by Chinese security officials in blue tracksuits, Metropolitan Police in reflective yellow jackets and rapid action/ riot police in black, by the time it had reached us at Westminster.
The torch and the bearer were so well concealed in the multiple layers of security cordons, that it took me a good while to comprehend that the Olympic flame had gone past me. By the time I realized what had happened, the entourage had disappeared behind a corner and several ambulances and police vans were rushing down the Westminster Bridge making a grand ruckus.
I didn't know exactly what route the relay was to take, but since I had seen, just this Friday, workers put up make-shift bleachers for the relay at South Bank Centre, I had a sense that the next stop would be a ceremony at the Centre. So after leisurely clicking a couple of pictures of the snow sliding off the slanted roofs of some landmarks, I ran towards the South Bank Centre, past the Town Hall and the London Eye.
The area was jam-packed by protestors weilding Tibetan flags and placards that read "Free Tibet", "China, Talk to Dalai Lama" and "Human Rights Before Olympics". A score of coppers were trying desperately to make sure that the venue didn't look "too dangerous" to the Chinese. Oh, and there were also two huge flailing-arm inflatable tube dolls sporting pro-Tibet banners. After a few attempts, I gave up the idea of getting closer to what would be the core of the festivities.
Instead, having spotted the Relay buses arrive on the Waterloo Bridge, I slid past the banner-wielding, slogan-mouthing crowd towards the stairs leading to the terrace; if the torch were to come down here, it would have to come through somewhere, and these stairs seemed at least as good as any other entrance.
Luckily, the Chinese decided to use these very stairs to bring down the Olympic Flame. That's correct: There was no torchbearer, only the blue track-suited Chinese, which perhaps made sense as there was no torch either, only the flame in its lantern.
So far, so good. But what next, considering that the ceremony at South Bank was likely to take a while, and there was not even a fleeting chance my being able to witness any of it, leave aside capturing any of it on camera?
I decided I wanted to beat the flame to the bridge and get to the parade before it started. So I ran to the Waterloo Bridge and discovered a barrier erected at the bridge's approach stairs. As I jumped over the barrier and ran up the stairs, I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, a policeman at the top of the stairs taking a couple of steps towards me. Thankfully the torch was nowhere in the vicinity, and he decided not to tackle me.
On the bridge I was greeted by a seemingly interminable line of police mobikes parked on either sides of the relay buses. Oh, and also by the slogans, imprinted on the official vehicles of the relay, "Lenovo: New World. New Thinking.", "Light the Passion, Share the Dream", which seemed so ironical in the situation.
Since I did not have a good sense of the scheduled route of the torch, I sneaked a good look at and committed to memory the stops scedule pasted on a police motorcycle's petrol tank; apparently, most police riders had pasted the schedule onto their mobikes for easy reference. This would stand me in good stead later on in the day.
There were about 10 Chinese students on the bridge, joyously waving a large Chinese flag and sporting Chinese-flag temporary-tattoos on their cheeks. There were also small groups of protestors, all over the bridge, adding up to about 100. They were mostly patiently holding on to their Tibetan flags, "Free Tibet" banners, and "Flame of Oppression" placards while chatting about and strolling on the bridge. Oh, and while I was there, which ended up being a long while, a group of 5-6 "hired Olympic supporters" in blue clothes and wigs went past, trying to hand out Samsung's balloons, pom-poms, little flags and assorted cheering material.
By the time the torch arrived, the bridge was packed with protestors waving flags, placards and banners, and shouting slogans. The contingent was caught in a vast sea of protestors just a short-way down from the bridge, and there it decided that instead of taking the straight road down to Somerset House, it would make a detour, at least the second in the day. The first one occured when the Chinese Ambassador had to carry the torch through China Town instead of the originally scheduled path.
After an unpublicised change to the route, the Chinese ambassador carried the torch through Chinatown. - BBC
China's ambassador to Britain, Fu Ying, carried the torch through Chinatown, following a different route than originally planned, before handing it over without incident, AP said. - CNN
Demonstrators swelled in number near the spot where Chinese Ambassador Fu Ying had been expected to carry the Olympic torch. Instead, Fu emerged with the torch in the heart of London's Chinatown, managing to jog unhindered before handing it over to the next participant. - AP
The real kicker came on Regent Street though when, for the first time in Olympic history, the torch had to be boarded on a bus and sped off. The protestors kept up with the bus, though, and we arrived at a jam-packed St. Paul's. There was supposed to a grand ceremony on the steps of the cathedral, but even after waiting and planning for at least 20 mts, the security were unable to get the torchbearers off the bus. They sped off again!
There was no way to tear through the crowd, so I decided to go through from behind the cathedral in order to catch up with the rocketing bus. It was a long detour, however, and I missed it. After running in the general direction in which the bus had been pointing before scooting away, I figured that I had lost it.
I knew, from the police schedule on the motorcycle tank, that the procession was to go down across the Thames before returning to the north side of the river. By the time I reached the bridge, though, the torch had cleared quite some distance on the south side, as indicated by the hovering helecopters. So I dashed to the Tower Bridge to catch the torch on its way back from the south side.
Thankfully, I reached there with enough time to spare to find myself a good spot before the police pilot arrived to clear the crowds. The torch came shortly afterwards; apparently they had resumed the running just before the Tower Bridge.
And then as a protestor, quite some distance ahead of the torch, got onto the road and waved a Tibetan flag, a police officer sprinted and dived on him to take him down. My camera was slow to respond and, regrettably, I couldn't capture the moment.
Photo source: NewsMax I had a great angle on this shot - much better than the above picture shows. I remember rueing the wasted opportunity. While it lasted only a second, it was my first brush with the journalistic dilemma.
To be fair, on one hand I was no journalist or reporter, and on the other there was hardly anything I could have done for the poor guy being pounced upon at that moment. But what shamed me was that my first thought was that of a photo-op rather than the injuries sustained by the protestor in question. Had I become so self-absorbed and conceited that getting a good picture was somehow more important than suffering of a fellow man?
The incident also set me thinking about the question of safety and freedom, and the way our law enforcement works.
It is not an accident that George Orwell's 1984 is set in London, nor that this town is the background for the Wachowski Brothers' movie V for Vendetta. It is easy to see how a little bit of push could convert England into a police state.
Throughout the relay till then and after then I saw the police tackle and handcuff protestors on their whim and fancies. I'm not trying to demonize the Met; I spoke with many of the policemen and most of them were quite jolly and good-natured when you engaged them in a good way. However, there were quite a few consistently nasty ones that took upon themselves to keep London safe from the voices of discontent. This minority bunch acted pretty heavy-handedly and to a good extent abused the carte blance afforded to them.
I couldn't help but think back to Philip Zimbardo's famous Stanford Prison Experiement, wherein perfectly healthy and nice students were transformed into sadistic guards and depressed prisoners by a mere role-play game over the short period of 6 days.
The funny aspect of it was that the Met Police behaved as if it were concerned for the well-being of the torchbearers when the fact remains that the safety of the torchbearers was never under threat, before, during or after they bore the torch. Not from the protestors, anyway.
The only harm that befell any one of them came from the security forces themselves. Specifically, Konnie Huq was “bashed about” when the Chinese security officials tried to prevent the torch from being snatched by an enterprising protestor. As Huq later recalled on a BBC program,
“…they wrestled him to the ground. There were so many people and everyone was shouting 'just keep going'…I was a bit bashed about but I guess that's par for the course in such a little brawl.”
The torch and torchbearers had to be packed off onto the bus and sped away again at Mile End.
There were quite some festivities planned at Stratford, with London 2012 welcoming Beijing 2008. But there was no stopping the Olympic torch bus, which just zoomed past towards Canary Wharf, leaving in its wake, just confusion and disappointment for the many colorful-costume-clad London 2012 performers, most of them children.
Even if one were unaware of the politics behind it all, one would have had to admit that there's something seriously wrong with a picture where the torch and the torchbearers are on a coach, and it's the police that's running all the way.
This was reminiscent of George W Bush’s inauguration wherein he made history by becoming the first president not to be able to walk over, and had to be sped off in his limo. And we all know how that turned out.
Anyhow, since it was impossible now to catch up to the torch, I spent some time participating in the London 2012 festivities before boarding the Jubilee Line tube to North Greenwich.
At the O2, the path and time of arrival of the torch was shrouded in mystery due to the by now familiar game of "keep 'em guessing" being played by those "responsible for the security of the sacred Olympic flame". Even so, when the torch arrived the thousands of protestors made the whole area echo with shouts of "Free Tibet", "Talk to Dalai Lama" and "Stop the Killings" though they did not attempt to break down the barricades, much to the relief of visibly nervous law enforcement officers.
The closing ceremony was cut short with the news that The Sugababes, whose performace formed the major part of the ceremony, had withdrawn from the event.
Instead, all that the crowd had the pleasure of was a speech in Mandarin by Jiang Xiaoyu, Executive & Vice President of the Beijing Olympics Organising Committee. And what a fantastic speech it was!
I use the term "fantastic" rather literally here to refer to the fact that Xiaoyu's speech seemed to be delivered from a fantasy world. While there were thousands upon thousands of protestors shouting slogans, jeering, and booing, Xiaoyu had his rose-tinted glasses firmly on, and his speech strictly scripted.
Xiaoyu delivered, with a wide smile, words completely contradictory to reality, choosing not to even acknowledge any glitches or deviances from the plan. Essentially, he thanked London for the "warm welcome" and waxed on how "successful" the torch relay had been. One would have expected him to at least have toned down the exuberance, but then again, the people in attendance that night weren't his audience, nor were the people around the world; his audience were the people back home, watching him on the state-run television.
This experience gave me some sense of what life might be like in a totalitarian regime. Don't get me wrong. I don't mean to say that I saw the kind of suffering that many have witnessed and endured in the communist societies; I'm not daft enough to even imagine that. Many nations have endured, and many continue to endure, unspeakable atrocities under closed governments. What happened here wasn't even a minuscule fraction of that.
What I do mean is that it opened for me a little window of understanding and insight into what it might be to live under an oppressive regime. I caught a slight, little glimpse of what it might be like when not just one is persecuted for having an opinion and voicing it, but also that one's voice is prevented from reaching the ears of one's fellow man. I caught gained a slightly better understanding of what it might be like when those in positions of power not only draw wrong conclusions based on the facts, but actually can choose to completely ignore the facts...choose to not acknowledge the facts.
And if the behavior of the Vice President of the Beijing Olympics Organising Committee surprised you, what would you say if I were to tell you that the Chinese media demonstrated a complete lack of journalistic integrity by completely omitting the protests from its news reports?
...Olympic flame was detoured away from its pre-planned route and placed on a bus on the advice of police, who said they could no longer guarantee to maintain order in the face of vigorous protests.
At points on the 31 mile route a phalanx of police officers, marching with their arms locked around each other's shoulders, had to form a protective ring around the flame in order to ensure that the torchbearer could continue to make progress.
Two activists were taken away by police after attempting to put out the torch with fire extinguishers. “Like many people in the UK we feel that China has no right parading the Olympic torch through London,” they said. “Our protest is not directed at the Chinese people whatsoever but instead at the brutal Chinese regime that rules them.”
“It is deeply sad that the Chinese through their brutality in Tibet have contaminated the Olympic ideal,” said Norman Baker MP, president of the Tibet Society, in a statement on the Free Tibet Campaign’s website.
Three rings of guards, both British police and Chinese officials, ran alongside anxious-looking torch bearers throughout the 31-mile (50-km) journey.
"We're here to get the message to the Chinese government to fulfil their promise to improve their human rights record, which they made when they got their Olympic bid in 2001," (Lizzy Pollard, 35, China campaign coordinator for a north London branch of Amnesty International) said.
The torch's journey was plagued from the start as snow showers covered London and kept many people away.
Demonstrators tried to board a relay bus after five-time Olympic gold medalist rower Steve Redgrave launched procession at Wembley Stadium — presaging a number of clashes with police along the torch's 31-mile journey.
The protests have forced officials to make unscheduled changes to the relay route, Metropolitan Police said. Thirty people have been arrested.
Activists demonstrating against China's human rights record and a recent crackdown on Tibet have been protesting along the torch route since the start of the flame's 85,000-mile odyssey from Ancient Olympia in Greece to Beijing, host of the 2008 Summer Olympics.
The Olympic torch has arrived at the O2 Arena after chaotic scenes during its tour of London as more than 35 protesters were arrested.
The parade was brought to a temporary halt five times in its first few miles as anti-China protesters made repeated attempts to breach security, including one man who tried to extinguish the flame with a fire extinguisher.
Former Blue Peter presenter Konnie Huq fell victim to one angry protestor who tried to snatch the torch from her hands and another tried to put the flame out with a fire extinguisher.
Protesters angry about China's human rights record and its recent actions in Tibet scuffled with police and made attempts to grab the Olympic torch and douse it with a fire extinguisher Sunday.
Unscheduled changes to the relay route and demonstrators trying to snuff out the Olympic torch are what police have been dealing with in London during today's torch relay.
Scores of Chinese officials in blue suits and British police on foot and bicycles guarded the celebrities and athletes carrying the torch but demonstrators repeatedly broke through their security cordon.
Hundreds lined Bayswater Road, many wearing Tibetan flags and carrying signs which read "Stop the killing in Tibet", "No Olympic torch in Tibet" and "China talk to Dalai Lama".
The heavy snow in London exerted slim effect on people's passion of seeing Beijing Olympic flame as large crowds lined along the street to greet the relay of torch on Sunday in the host city of 2012 Games.
London boasted the longest relay of nearly 50 kilometers among cities outside China's mainland.
"It's really a great pleasure to see Londoners smiling and waving."
alongwith a feel-good photo that had the caption
(Torchbearer Giles Emily (C) holds the torch during the Olympic torch relay in London, capital of Britain, April 6, 2008)
There was not a single mention of any protests, let alone disruptions. Not one mention!
And the organizers cannot even simply shrug and say that they merely used the news item filed by the state-controlled Xinhua News Agency, because they strategically omitted one sentence from the Xinhua story:
Redgrave just criticized the binding of Olympics and politics days before the relay.
This is a strong indication that the Olympic organizers don’t even want to let out the fact that there were any protests. It would seem audacious and foolhardy on their part to believe that they could keep 1.3 billion people in the dark. Unless it were true.
Oh, and their Found a mistake link, meant to allow readers to report errors, was not working on the page carrying this news story.
Most Chinese media outlets toed the Xinhua line, with the "happy news" pictures:
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown (4th L), British Olympic Minister Tessa Jowell (5th L) and torchbearer Denise Lewis (6th L) applaud as disabled torchbearer Ali Jawad (3rd L) starts with the torch outside 10 Downing Street in London, capital of Britain, April 6, 2008.
Torchbearer Fu Ying, China's Ambassador to the United Kingdom, runs with the torch during the Olympic torch relay in London, capital of Britain, April 6, 2008.
and several pictures showing cheerful crowds bearing Chinese flags egging on the torchbearer. Of course, what they fail to mention is that these photos are actually from China Town to where the torch had to be detoured when the protesting crowds had made it impossible for Chinese Ambassador Ying to carry the torch through the scheduled route.
As far as I have found, the only Chinese media outlet to have mentioned any disruptions is Shanghai Daily (I am guessing that its audience consists, in large part, a Western-expat population working in Shanghai):
Of course, it quickly qualifies that headline with:
As part of a grand festival in London, tens of thousands people lined the route of the relay to cheer the event, far outnumbering protesters.
This, of course, is utter rubbish. The “Journey of Harmony” was so marred by disruptions that it cost London over £1 million to provide security for the event.
Many spectators voiced disapproval of attempts to disrupt the torch relay by those who claimed they had done so for "political causes." Cathy Sing, a London resident, said that she was puzzled by the protesters who said they were supporting the "independence of Tibet." "Tibet has been part of China for several hundred years," she said, adding that the disruption had been well-planned to tarnish China's image.
I have no doubt that Cathy is a London resident. I do wonder, though, what sort of a surname "Sing" is. My money is on Chinese.
Nick, a British university student who was watching the event in central London, said that "sports should be separated from political things."
And what, pray tell, be your surname "Nick"? I am betting that Shanghai Daily meant British-university student, not British university-student.
This is not to say that the Western media is completely objective and journalistically rigorous.
For instance, while all world media outlets except the Chinese ones reported that The Sugababes backed out from their closing ceremony performance,
In a blow to the relay's finale, pop band The Sugababes withdrew from the closing event saying one of their singers was suffering with laryngitis. - The Guardian
some failed to report that, as BBC noted, they had participated in one leg of the relay earlier in the day.
Girl band The Sugababes withdrew from the finale at the last minute, saying singer Amelle Berrabah had been diagnosed with laryngitis. They had earlier carried the torch on an open top bus down Oxford Street.
As far as I have been able to determine, in the aftermath of the protests, only France24 reported the Dalai Lama's statement, "The hosting of the Olympic Games this year is a matter of great pride to the 1.2 Billion Chinese people. I have, from the very beginning supported the holding of these games in Beijing. I feel the Tibetians should not cause any hinderance to the games."
1 mt 11 secs
Please click the Play button above. Video source: France 24
Similarly, the media's discomfort with "lawbreakers" surfaces when it seems to imply that torchbearer Konnie Huq was in some way harmed, "bashed about" to be precise, by the protestors.
The fact, of course, is that Huq was bashed about in the Chinese security personnel's efforts to save the torch from being snatched (Naturally! Where did you think the loyalties of the Chinese security agencies lay - with the torch or with the bearers - when you allowed them to be the first ring around the torch?). This is clear from the videos of the incident as also from Huq's statement. Most media outlets simply chose to not use her full quote, and to plant some seeds in the readers' imagination.
However, the Western media occasionally just indulges in the sin of spin. It hardly ever, if ever, completely fabricates stories or buries news. The extent of media manipulation in the West is usually limited to ideological representation, not distortion of facts. (If you are Al Franken and want to call me to tell about Fox News etc. in the US, don't bother. I've read your books - they are excellent and hilarious)
Besides, due to the multiplicity of voices, the biases of one vehicle are typically balanced by those of the other. Thus, a person committed to the truth can, at least theoretically, examine all available evidence and make up his or her own mind about issues.
Not so in China, where the press apparently has no professional integrity at all.
After such blatant disregard for truth shown by the Chinese reportage of the London relay, the question is exactly how willing are we to accept China’s claims that about the scale, extent, and intensity of oppression in Tibet? How honorable are China’s intentions, and how credible are its promises?
But the Olympics are about bringing the world together and it is not right to mix politics with sports, most critics of the protests will tell you. In fact, this is the strongest rationale presented by pro-rally, anti-prostest speakers, both Chinese and non-Chinese.
Beijing Olympic torch relay spokesman Qu Yingpu told the BBC: "This is not the right time, the right platform, for any people to voice their political views."
Julie Li, 28, also from China but living in Britain, said sport and politics should be kept apart. - The Guardian
(Sir Steve) Redgrave just criticized the binding of Olympics and politics days before the relay. - Xinhua
My gut reaction is to label this as disingenuity. But if any of these speakers actually believe what they are saying, then they are displaying incredible naïveté. The fact is that the international relay of the Olympic torch was started in 1936 by Adolf Hitler to make a statement about Germany's status in the world.
For the 2008 games, China has taken the sentiment to heart and has already irrevocably mixed the Olympics with politics by declaring that the Olympic torch would go through Tibet, in order to make the statement that Tibet is a part of China. Having made such an overtly political move, it is hypocritical and unbelievably audacious on China’s part to appeal that there be no political statements around Olympic-related activities, and no sensible person would buy into China’s rationalization.
Protesters are particularly incensed that the torch will be carried through Tibet by Chinese officials in June. The Free Tibet Campaign accuses Beijing of using the torch for its own propaganda purposes. - The Times
Besides, of course, it is no secret that the Olympics have seen wide-ranging boycotts in 1956, 1976, 1980 and 1984 for political reasons. The People's Republic of China itself did not participate in Olympics till 1984 protesting Taiwan's participation.
So please don't tell us that politics has no role in sports or vice-versa. Politics and sports have always gone hand in hand, and always will.
It is widely believed that China annexed Tibet in 1959. China may sincerely believe that Tibet is and has always been an integral part of its territory. It may be possible to arrive at a peaceful solution to these political differences. But instead of talking with Dalai Lama (who has always advocated peace and friendship towards China), China chooses to import Hun Chinese into Tibet (so much so, that the Huns now outnumber Tibetans in Tibet) and to persecute and even execute Tibetans. If this doesn't give the world a genuine reason for an outcry out of outrage, what would?
Some critics of the protests also point to the fact that Dalai Lama himself has supported the games and asked that they not be boycotted. These statements betray a misunderstanding of the protests.
When Beijing had bid for the 2008 Olympics, China had promised to improve its human-rights record in Tibet. However, just last month violent oppression of Tibetans protestors has raised the heckles of the likes of Amnesty International. While Beijing puts the casualties down to low two digits, there is no way to independently verify this as China has completely locked Tibet down.
This is a regime that gunned down hundreds, if not thousands, of its own students (remember Tiananmen Square?); would it have and would it in the future hesitate for a second to kill or torture the Tibetans?
...human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell jumped into the road carrying a sign calling for the release of Chinese activist Hu Jia, who was jailed Thursday. "The arrest last week of human rights activist Hu Jia shows that China is not fulfilling its human rights commitments which were part of the deal for them to get the Olympics," Tatchell told PA, "At the very least, world leaders should boycott the opening ceremony and athletes should wear Tibetan flags when they go on the podium to receive their medals." - CNN
(Buddhist monk Ngawang Khyentse) said, "We can't just remain silent. We have no other choice than to protest because there is no other voice for Tibetans inside Tibet, so we have to speak out for human rights." "At the very least the British government has to speak out and condemn the crackdown in Tibet. They must not keep silent." - The London Paper
The protests are really demands that China fulfill its promise by stopping the massacre and allow Red Cross and international journalists in Tibet.
(Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell) told BBC Radio 4's The World This Weekend: "I hope that the message that will go round the world is that, yes, there are many citizens of the UK who feel very strongly about China's human rights record, there are people in the UK who feel very strongly about the importance of dialogue with the Dalai Lama, and that in the UK we cherish the right to lawful and peaceful protest which, by and large, is what we have seen today." - The Telegraph
While organization of Beijing Olympics almost seems inevitable at this point in time, the event has been irreversibly politicized, and sooner or later every country will be called upon to take a stand on the issue one way or the other.
By now it has been widely reported that the relay route was cut short and altered in Paris and that the torch completed a large part of the route on coach because of the intense protests. It is also well known that the Olympic flame was put out on at least three occasions in Paris.
Three times in the course of its 28-kilometer route through the City of Lights, the Olympic flame was extinguished by security officials due to the unprecedented number of demonstrations, forcing authorities to put the torch on a bus for security reasons.
A planned ceremony at the city’s grand City Hall, to mark the torch’s passage through Paris was cancelled, according to the office of the Paris mayor.
And while this report does acknowledge for the first time the presence of protestors and concedes that part of the relay was continued on coach, there is no mention of the fact it was extinguished on several occasions.
Instead, it goes on to state something you may not have heard before:
Spectators of the Beijing Olympic torch relay were greatly annoyed and angered by Tibetan separatists and their supporters attempting to disrupt the Monday event in Paris, the fifth leg of the flame's global tour.
Tens of thousands spectators went to the street of Paris to watch the torch relay, which covers 28 kilometers starting the Eiffel Tower and ending at the Stade (Stadium) Charlety in the south of the city.
For a humorous and satirical take on the relay, check out The Daily Show's report: 3 mts 13 secs
--- Update 17 April: New Delhi ---
My interest in the torch's relay through New Delhi is quite natural. For one, I was curious to see the attitudes of my own people towards the relay. But even more importantly, what happens in India is extremely important from the perspective that India houses hundreds of thousands of Tibetan refugees - the largest Tibetan population anywhere outside of Tibet.
And I had to satisfy my curiosity by parsing media reports.
...security personnel far outnumbering the schoolboys and the other few select onlookers allowed to watch.
An estimated 16,000 police, soldiers and even elite commandos were deployed to throw up a huge security cordon around the central thoroughfare between the presidential palace and India Gate, two of New Delhi's main landmarks.
Another 46 Tibetans were arrested in India's financial capital Mumbai as they tried to storm the Chinese consulate...
In neighbouring Nepal, police said they had arrested more that 500 Tibetan refugees as they protested outside the Chinese embassy...
...officials shortened the original 5.6 mile (9 km) torch route to 1.5 miles (2.3 km), and lined it with more than 15,000 security personnel for the 30-minute event.
Officers detained another 32 protesters even before the torch touched down on Indian soil...
There were almost no crowds apart from some flag-waving Chinese and a few dozen school children bussed in by officials. Surrounded by Chinese attendants, Indian security guards in tracksuits, and police and troops with automatic rifles, runners could only wave to the television cameras.
Having lived in New Delhi for several years, I have to say that the short straight stretch between Rashtrapati Bhavan and India Gate is like a huge stadium, and if the access roads to it are blocked, it's pretty much like having a private ceremony.
The numbers of police and army depolyed are astounding. Exactly what does a deployment of 15,000 law enforcement officials mean? Well, consider this: if on average an officer measures 40 cm wide shoulder-to-shoulder, then 15,000 of them standing shoulder to shoulder could line the whole 2.3 km stretch 2.6 times!
Since the torch doesn't quite need the whole 2.3 km at the very same second, here's another way to look at it: If the 15,000 officers were to cordon-off the torch by standing in adjacent concentric circles, with the closest one being as far away from the torch as 5m, then there would be at least 75 layers of policemen's bodies between an observer and the torch!
I would have been disappointed with my people's showing, but I take solace in the fact that Indian Football's biggest star Baichung Bhutia and International Cricket's biggest star Sachin Tendulkar opted out of the relay (three booes to Leander Paes, Dhanraj Pillai and Aamir Khan).
Additionally, there's some comfort in CNN's words:
Public sympathy in India lies with the Tibetans, the majority of whom have sought refuge there since a failed uprising against China in 1959...But Indian officials had to balance public sentiment with diplomatic needs. Since India and China fought a border war in 1962, they have tried to thaw their frosty relations and forge close ties.
That said, while I understand the need to be polite to China, and to make all security arrangements necessary, I can not, for the life of me, understand why Delhi's Chief Minister Shiela Dixit felt the need to personally participate in the proceedings. That she herself handled the torch is untenable.
The most amusing part of the New Delhi leg of the relay was not at the torch relay at all.
Apparently, (to use CNN's words) "...to wrongfoot protesters, Indian authorities did not disclose the relay route or the start time until 24 hours before the event", and then "...sealed off roads..."
Faced with these formidable challenges, the protestors demonstrated remarkable but characteristic ingenuity, and organized their own torch relay, which started off at Rajghat, Mahatma Gandhi's memorial. This was a cross-community event, with at least Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist religious leaders participating.
While security forces were deployed at this torch relay as well to prevent unpleasant scenes, most media descriptions of the atmosphere at this relay include the word "festive". In fact, CNN reported that at this event, the police were merrily chatting with the participants, and even passing around drinking water.
So while the Olympic Torch's "Journey of Harmony", which is supposed to be a people's event, was effectively held behind closed doors, the Tibetan torch relay had all the elements of a festive, participative, grassroots event.
